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Gender in Chess: a Mixed-Method Approach

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Gender in Chess: a Mixed-Method Approach Gender in Chess: a mixed-method approach ASTRID BARBIER Student number: 01811554 Promotor: Prof. dr. Veerle Draulans Master thesis submitted to obtain the degree of Master in Gender and Diversity August 12, 2020 Academic article Words: 11,962 This master’s thesis is an examination document that has not been corrected for errors found. Publications may refer to this thesis, subject to the written permission of the supervisor, who is mentioned by name on the title page. (Nederlands) Deze masterproef is een examendocument dat niet werd gecorrigeerd voor eventueel vastgestelde fouten. In publicaties mag naar dit werk worden gerefereerd, mits schriftelijke toelating van de promotor die met naam op de titelpagina is vermeld. 1 ABSTRACT The primary purpose of this study is to determine the profile of a female chess player. 709 male and female chess players completed an international survey examining a chess player’s profile, the perceived image of a good chess player and societal gendered expectations. Furthermore, in-depth interviews were carried out with ten female chess players from Flanders and the Netherlands in order to gain an understanding of the impact of the female chess player’s minority position. The results reveal that, on average, chess players have a high ‘chess capital’, even before they start playing chess. A conflict is found in the self-description of female chess players and what they associate with femininity. Female chess players have the feeling that they stand out due to their minority position, which in turn leads to advantages and disadvantages. Keywords: chess players, gender, gender roles, minority ABSTRACT (Nederlands) Het hoofddoel van deze studie is om het profiel van een vrouwelijke schaker te bestuderen. 709 mannelijke en vrouwelijke schakers vulden een internationale enquête in die het profiel van een schaker, de beeldvorming rond een goede schaker en de maatschappelijke verwachtingen op het gebied van gender onderzocht. Verder zijn diepte-interviews afgenomen bij tien vrouwelijke schakers uit Vlaanderen en Nederland om inzicht te krijgen in de impact van hun minderheidspositie. De resultaten laten zien dat schaakspelers gemiddeld een hoog ‘schaakkapitaal’ hebben, zelfs voordat ze begonnen met schaken. Een conflict is gevonden in hoe vrouwelijke schakers zichzelf beschrijven en wat ze associëren met vrouwelijkheid. Vrouwelijke schakers vinden dat ze opvallen door hun minderheidspositie, wat leidt tot voor- en nadelen. Kernwoorden: schakers, gender, genderrollen, minderheid 2 Index ABSTRACT 2 I. INTRODUCTION 5 Research regarding chess and gender 5 Part I: Fixing the numbers 5 Part II: Fixing the institutions: context matters 6 Part III: Fixing the knowledge 7 Research regarding stem and gender: inspiration for chess & gender research 9 Part I: (Family) Science Capital 9 Part II: Dual identity of female engineers 10 Aims from this gender & chess study 10 II. DATA AND METHOD 11 Survey 11 Interviews 13 III. RESULTS 14 The profile of a chess player 14 Part I: (Family) social capital of a chess player 15 Part II: Influencing factors to start, to continue, or to stop playing chess 20 Part III: Characteristics chess players attribute to themselves 22 Image of chess players and gender roles 25 Part I: Association with a good chess player, masculinity and femininity 25 Part II: Image of a chess player compared to gender roles 29 Part III: Participant’s image compared to the image of a chess player and gender roles 31 The experience of female chess players with respect to their minority position 33 Part I: The minority position of girls and women in the chess world 34 Part II: Imaging and stereotyping 37 IV. DISCUSSION 38 Profiling chess players 38 Image of a chess player and gender roles 39 Female chess players’ experiences 40 Limitations 40 Research and practical recommendations 41 Conclusion 42 V. REFERENCE LIST 43 3 4 I. INTRODUCTION In the chess world, there is a substantial difference between the performance of male and female players. Male chess players outperform female players in all categories and the current top 100 only includes one female chess player. In each country, male chess players hold the top FIDE rating scores which are considered an objective measure of a chess player’s strength (FIDE International Chess Federation, 2020). Research has been conducted to examine the behaviour and differences between men and women in chess (Subia, Amaranto, L., Amaranto, C., Bustamante & Damaso, 2019, among others). One difference that is often highlighted is the large participation gap between men and women, with women being a strong minority in both chess tournaments and training events (Bilalić, McLeod & Gobet, 2007; Smerdon, 2019). In the STEM area, which is often considered chess-like in terms of gender issues, studies have approached the low participation rates of female students at STEM faculties by profiling these students (Blanch, 2016). The present study will likewise approach the low participation rates of female chess players by profiling female chess players. A survey among chess players tries to answer two of the main research questions, namely ‘What is the profile of a chess player?’ and ‘What characteristics do male and female chess players associate with being a (good) chess player and with masculinity and femininity?’. For the last research question, ‘How do female chess players experience their minority position in the chess world?’, ten in-depth interviews were carried out with female chess players from Flanders and the Netherlands. To describe the various studies on chess and gender, the three approaches presented by Schiebinger and Schraudner are used as a guideline. These approaches are ‘fixing the numbers’, i.e. focusing on increasing female participation; ‘fixing the institutions’, i.e. ​ ​ transforming structures and removing barriers, and ‘fixing the knowledge’, i.e. ​ incorporating gender analysis into research (Schiebinger & Schraudner, 2011). RESEARCH REGARDING CHESS AND GENDER Part I: Fixing the numbers No woman has ever been world champion and only two percent of all grandmasters (the highest attainable title in chess) are female. When looking at these data, a male superiority is quickly assumed. However, one of the first studies on this topic by Charmess and Gerchak (1996), pointed out that relative group sizes should be taken into account before group differences in performance can be properly assessed. In chess, this means that the participation rate needs to be taken into account before any assumptions about the difference in the performance can be made. From the figures in the table below it is clear that women still make up a small percentage of the total chess population (FIDE International Chess Federation, 2020). 5 Table 1 A study from 2006, which contains data from more than 250,000 tournament players from all over the world over the age of 13, shows that more boys than girls play in the younger age groups. This results in quantitative dominance of men at the highest level of chess. This study suggests that researchers should investigate why fewer girls participate in competitive chess (Chabris & Glickman, 2006). A study from 2009, based on the analysis of the ratings of German chess players, concludes that the higher performance of men is mainly explained by a basic principle of statistics which states that extreme values are more often found in larger populations. ​​ Considering that more men play chess, this leads to higher performing male players (Bilalić, Smallbone, McLeod & Gobet, 2009). Using the same data as in the previous study, Knapp (2010) claims that participation rates explain only two-thirds of the performance gap. Further research by Blanch, Aluja and Cornadó (2015) based on the Swiss-manager database, which contains worldwide information, and data from six tournaments in Spain suggests that biosocial factors such as age and training could also play an important role in explaining the performance gap: women train less, and the rating difference between men and women was smaller among players in the 25 to 30 age bracket. A study by Blanch (2016), based on information from 24 Euro-Asian countries, suggests that similar factors such as age and involvement play an important role. According to Wiesend (2019), a gender-specific difference in performance is already present from the age at which players first participate in tournaments. The study focused on players in the FIDE and German databases who were active between the ages of 12 and 18. Part II: Fixing the institutions: context matters Most chess tournaments are open to all genders. However, female-only tournaments do exist, aiming to promote and increase female participation (Smerdon, 2019; Root, 2020). In addition to women's tournaments, other measures intended to promote women's chess, such as special women’s titles and prizes, exist. Although these measures are often implemented, the remaining participation gap shows that they are not sufficient. In 2019, Smerdon analysed how women’s participation rates vary across the world, using both the UN gender equality index and data from Jeff Sonas. The UN gender equality index scores countries according to their gender equality. Meanwhile, Sonas is a statistical chess analyst whose data include female participation rates in chess in various countries between 1999 and 2015 (Sonas, n.d.). Smerdon concludes that countries ranking higher in gender equality do not have higher female participation rates. Instead, the female participation rate gets higher as the equality scale goes down. This 6 phenomenon, known as the gender equality paradox, is also found in STEM. Research shows that countries which score higher on gender equality often have fewer women in the STEM field (Stoet & Geary, 2018). According to Smerdon, although there is only a small percentage of female chess players in all countries, large differences in female participation rates between countries still exist. The age distribution of a country’s chess community plays a decisive role in the participation rate of female chess players.
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